On yet another bitterly cold night in the deadest part of Toronto winter, I picked up Rue Morgue’s ever-loving Gore-Met from his brand new penthouse suite in Toronto’s nether region for another hotly anticipated extreme metal show: the return of the unstoppable death metal monsters Cannibal Corpse. Rounding out this ferocious bill was Sweden’s Tribulation (reviewed in RM #135), their satanic countrymen Aeon, and Poland’s mighty blackened death horde Behemoth. Of course, the obvious thing to do would be to book an interview with Cannibal Corpse – a huge favourite of el Gore-Met – but we thought we’d change it up and take on one of the little guys. After all, some of the finest extreme metal must be excavated from the underground, so after a satisfyingly chunky and technically proficient set by Aeon, we headed to the Phoenix’ foul-smelling backstage for a short interview with founding guitarist Zeb Nilsson.

The new horror film Valley of the Sasquatch recently began its film festival run with a world premiere last weekend at the Nevermore Film Festival in North Carolina. But for writer/director John Portanova, the process of bringing this story of a fractured family battling a tribe of angry Sasquatch to life was years in the making.

“Growing up I spent most of my free time studying cryptozoology and the unknown,” Portanova said. “Instead of going outside and playing for recess, I would read books from the 001 section of the library about encounters with Bigfoot or alien abductions. My after school viewing habits consisted of watching paranormal investigation shows such as Unsolved Mysteries or Sightings. Years later when I graduated from film school, I took some time off so I could write my first real screenplay. There was only one idea that really inspired me: making a scary and action-packed movie that respected the history of Sasquatch.”